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Anti Trust on DMOZ

Discussion in 'ODP / DMOZ' started by Dominic, May 17, 2005.

  1. jimnoble

    jimnoble Well-Known Member

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    #81
    I'm sure you mean well minstrel, but there's a piece of the jigsaw puzzle that you're missing.

    What you see on the public side of RZ isn't always the entire truth and it would be an error to judge a situation by what's visible (think iceberg).

    You'll just have to trust me on this, because I'm not going to provide specific instances. When an editor's patience threshold is transgressed, it's usually with very good reason. I'd be amazed if most of the recipients of their ire weren't fully aware of what they did to incur it.

    ... but they often play innocent of course :).
     
    jimnoble, May 19, 2005 IP
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  2. gworld

    gworld Prominent Member

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    #82

    You can always buy the information from a DMOZ editor. :rolleyes:

    I think macdesign offers to sell you this information for about $25 if I remember correctly in one of his sites. :)
     
    gworld, May 19, 2005 IP
  3. gworld

    gworld Prominent Member

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    #83
    And what P***s the intelligent, honest people is that the corrupt morons at DMOZ think that people are so stupid that they believe their BS and spammer song. :D
     
    gworld, May 19, 2005 IP
  4. jlawrence

    jlawrence Peon

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    #84
    jimnoble: you're quite correct, the public side that is seen on the RZ is no where near the whole picture. I'm pretty sure that the vast majority of dmoz editors take what they do seriously and do a very good job.
    But, the public side is all that matters. After all, hackers aren't people who break into computers but as far as the public is concerned they are. The public face you (ie dmoz) show is all that matters. The public face is RZ, and in the main that face isn't well liked. If the public don't like dmoz (and all the see is the RZ) then dmoz will die. Like it or not, the Internet is still in it's infancy. We've only got a fraction of the sites on line now that we'll have in a few year. DMOZ must sort things out if it's to survive and prosper as a useful resource.
     
    jlawrence, May 19, 2005 IP
  5. jimnoble

    jimnoble Well-Known Member

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    #85
    I'm struggling to think of any RZ post from a 'civilian'. There might have been some or there might be a few lurkers, but the only people that I've seen there have been in the trade - website promoters of various varieties, ODP editors and even editors from other directories. (Some of the latter have subsequently joined us, as have a few webmasters).

    Death of ODP? So long as the editors have servers available to them (remember that a bunch of editors fund RZ, not Netscape), it'll be a long time coming IMHO. I could go on about community and mission and such, but it's all been said here before and isn't thought to be relevent so I won't :) .
     
    jimnoble, May 19, 2005 IP
  6. jlawrence

    jlawrence Peon

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    #86
    you might well have a point there - about there being no 'civilian' in RZ. Thing is though, how many people in the 'trade' are going to go out of their way to submit to a directory where they now can get absolutely zero feedback.
    hmmm, community. That would depend upon your definition of community. IIRC, the mission is to be the best resource on the net (or something like that), and the community might struggle with the work load of achieving that if the 'trade' stop submitting their new sites.
    At the minute, I'd suggest that the 'trade' only go throught the hastle of submitting to dmoz because of the added benefit that Google supposedly gives to links in there. If G drops dmoz, then so will most of the 'trade' - unless things change considerably. Will it happen, who knows, but there it's certainly more than a possibility.
     
    jlawrence, May 19, 2005 IP
  7. gworld

    gworld Prominent Member

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    #87
    You can have as many computers as you like but as soon as Google drops DMOZ, for all practical purposes DMOZ and it's bastard child RZ are dead.
     
    gworld, May 19, 2005 IP
  8. jimnoble

    jimnoble Well-Known Member

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    #88
    I fully accept that ODP will cease to be of interest to many webmasters should this happen. I'm not sure that's the same as death...

    ...though some editors would certainly think it to be a blessed relief :).
     
    jimnoble, May 19, 2005 IP
  9. jlawrence

    jlawrence Peon

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    #89
    No gworld, dmoz won't be dead. It will be just another directory with more PR than most others.
    But without feedback, it will die. I'm assuming the community referred to is the community of editors, because without feedback to people submitting sites it ain't helping any other community.
    I still believe that things can change at dmoz, but they have to change before things go down hill any further - I'm sure there are enough (more than enough) good honest editors at dmoz to effect change.
     
    jlawrence, May 19, 2005 IP
  10. Alucard

    Alucard Peon

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    #90
    One of the common misconceptions about what makes the ODP grow is that the only source of listings is from submissions. That's far from the case. The mission of the editors is to build a category in a subject, no matter what source is used for the URLs. It could be ads on TV, local papers, picking up business cards at restaurants, other web sites. The signal-to-noise ratio of those sources when compared to the submissions is significantly better. So much so that there are a not insignificant number of editors who use those sorts of sources as their only sources for new listings.

    There have been several suggestions over the years of me being an editor to just turn off submissions completely. Quite a few editors feel that the ODP would not lose much by doing so, and save ourselves a lot of hassle. Editors could then go out and search for sites, rather than feeling like they just "process" submissions.

    I personally think that the suggestions in submissions can be a good source of new listings, but it's certainly not my only source.
     
    Alucard, May 19, 2005 IP
  11. tradefor

    tradefor Peon

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    #91
    Alucard
    re:
    "There have been several suggestions over the years of me being an editor to just turn off submissions completely. Quite a few editors feel that the ODP would not lose much by doing so, and save ourselves a lot of hassle. Editors could then go out and search for sites, rather than feeling like they just "process" submissions"

    I think this gets towrds the heart of the matter. There are totally different agendas as between the submitters to the Directory; and those who choose to edit it.

    If you look upon submissions as an irksome "hassle", then you will tend to have a negative attititude toward any submitted site, from the get go; and an even more negative attitude towards any sites that increase your burden by asking the status of their submission - the expression of that irritation comes across as unhelpful, condesending and arrogant, rather like the example cited in my earlier post.

    If the alternative is to close the directory to new submissions, and proactively look for sites that add quality and usefulness to the Directory, then a few things must apply:
    1. An editor should be qualified by reason of expertise in the category, and a commitment to making it better, so that the specifications and results of his or her proactive search are insightful to a user of the Directory, not the garbage I found in the Directory relative to my own area of expertise.
    2. Where does this leave a site that by misfortune happens to be in a cat where there is no named editor in the first of second tiers? It seems to me unreasonable to expect upper tier editors to proactively search search for inclusions to a cat where they may have no natural interest or expertise. About the only thing worse for webmasters in such categories would be to rely on inclusion in the Directory being a function of how many business cards you leave at local restauraunts.

    Why not at least get more funding from the SEs to put in place an automated tracking system for submitted sites, accessible by the site submitter? This would reduce the burden on the editors, and reduce the anger and frustration of website owners who are currently completely in the dark as regards their site's submission status.

    I have sense that unless DMOZ can't find a way to work with all the consituents in the community (Search end-users,SEs, and webmasters), it will loose all respect and relevance. Once the SEs realize that DMOZ results are irrelevant, they will drop it like a rock, and editing it will simply be revert to being a geekish hobby. The "corrupt" editors will instantly make their excuses and leave.
     
    tradefor, May 19, 2005 IP
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  12. davedx

    davedx Peon

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    #92
    Exactly. And who runs the site? Not the people submitting to it.

    My personal view of dmoz is it's a slow but useful FREE resource. Remember that word, FREE. I've submitted maybe 5-6 sites to dmoz, I think 2-3 are listed. To be honest, I don't keep track, and I certainly don't lose sleep or jump on the "slam dmoz" bandwagon on SEO forums every time the topic pops up week after week after week.

    I can totally understand the editors being defensive when faced with some of the attitudes here. The responses on this thread by editors have been more courteous than some of the posts by DP members. I dread to think what RZ might get like.

    As for the talk about anti-trust or getting them done for taxation... it's just childish. It's a free resource that Google places a heavy weight on. So what? Are you going to start thinking about sueing Google next because your sites aren't #1?

    I feel like I'm in a minority here, but I for one appreciate dmoz and accept it for what it is.. It's NOT the "golden bullet" of SEO, and if some of you spent half the time actually promoting your site that you did writing self-righteous forum posts condemning it, you might actually see that. :eek:
     
    davedx, May 19, 2005 IP
  13. nddb

    nddb Peon

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    #93
    A kick in the balls is free too. Doesn't make it good or useful. I don't see how useful it is being so backlogged. I wonder how many people actually use DMOZ to find something, as opposed to just using google, or one of the other major SEs. I know I've never gone to DMOZ to find something. DMOZ = Backlinks/PR/google weight... whatever.

    I have sites listed in DMOZ, for the one that's easier to check... you know how many times DMOZ shows up in the referer in the last year? once. LOL.
     
    nddb, May 19, 2005 IP
  14. Alucard

    Alucard Peon

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    #94
    nbbd - so what are you saying? That you feel that the ODP is unimportant, outdated and, essentially useless, valueless and worthless? I don't want to put words in your mouth/fingers but this is what I think I am reading.
     
    Alucard, May 19, 2005 IP
  15. nddb

    nddb Peon

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    #95
    Just wondering how many people actually use it for it's alleged intended purpose, and how many people (editors especially) exploit it for links and google weight.

    And how useful is something that has stale content? Huge backlogs (i.e. new sites not listed for years), dead links all over the place... etc. I checked about 13k dmoz links, a tiny fraction of the total and found hundreds of dead links, usually because of no DNS entries.

    Also, I wonder how hard it would be to give some kind of submission status. It was explained to me on the RZ that automatic submission status is not given because of spammers, but every other site on the net can deal with spammers, but DMOZ can't? I just got sick of arguing it at the RZ, because the answer is always : "These things you complain about are the way they are because of the way DMOZ is run which, of course, will not change."

    Questions can be implications, or they can just be questions. Defining ODP as useless really depends on the answers, not the questions.
     
    nddb, May 19, 2005 IP
  16. Alucard

    Alucard Peon

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    #96
    nddb, I am assuming (possibly incorrectly again) that if you checked 13k links you were doing it in some automated way, and that the hundreds of dead links would be reported in a file, somewhere?

    If so, I would be very pleased if you could PM me and I will give you an email address to send them to, so that I can deal with as many of them as I have time.

    Thanks.
     
    Alucard, May 19, 2005 IP
  17. minstrel

    minstrel Illustrious Member

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    #97
    Not exactly. It's really because there are so many angry anti-DMOZ threads on so many forums at this very moment that the editors don't have time any more to hang around The Resourceless Zone insulting people because they're all popping their snotty little noses into threads like this one. :mad:
     
    minstrel, May 19, 2005 IP
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  18. Alucard

    Alucard Peon

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    #98
    Sorry, minstrel. Didn't realise that we weren't welcome, here. We know better now (or at least I do).
     
    Alucard, May 19, 2005 IP
  19. minstrel

    minstrel Illustrious Member

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    #99
    And you'll just have to forgive me, Jim, but I'm fresh out of trust for DMOZ editors, at least the RZ ones (think power-mad insult machines).
     
    minstrel, May 19, 2005 IP
  20. minstrel

    minstrel Illustrious Member

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    #100
    You assume that the people who post about their frustration about DMOZ do NOT spend time promoting their sites elsewhere? That's more than a little naive...

    I can't/won't speak for nddb but that is exactly my opinion of DMOZ. The only vestige of importance it still hangs onto is its link to the Google Directory.
     
    minstrel, May 19, 2005 IP